1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for a multipoint call service in a mobile terminal.
2. Description of the Related Art
Mobile terminals have evolved over recent years from cell phones serving a basic telephone function, to contemporary smart phones having Internet, multi-media and rich display functionality. In line with this trend, various recording/playing-related features are provided, such as a call recording/playing feature, a voice recording feature, and an automatic responding feature.
Among these features, the conventional call recording/playing feature is a general function of storing recorded audio of a call as call data in a memory within the mobile terminal, and playing back the stored call data at a future time.
Services for allowing a user to talk to several persons on his mobile terminal may be roughly classified into two types of services: a multipoint call service and a conference call service.
A conference call, as the term is used herein, is a call involving at least three parties, each using his own communication terminal with a unique phone number in a communication network. (This type of conference call is distinguished from the traditional conference call in which a group of persons may sit around a single speaker phone to speak with another party over a single communication channel.) Thus the conference call involves setting up multiple communication lines, one to each communication terminal. Typically this is done with conference bridge equipment at a server, base station or the like. In the conference call, each party receives voice signals originating from every other party throughout the call.
A multipoint call also involves at least three parties, but differs from a conference call in that the communication terminal that originated the call (the “originating” or “controlling” terminal) has the capability of activating and deactivating call lines to the various other parties. For an activated call line, the party connected thereto is free to converse with the originating terminal and with all other parties connected to activated call lines. Hence a party connected to an activated call line receives voice signals originating from the originating terminal and from all other parties with activated call lines. Typically this is accomplished with a similar network bridge at the network server. A deactivated party is essentially “put on hold” or in a suspended state, such that voice signals transmitted on the deactivated call line are not received at the originating terminal or by other parties. Depending on the services of the network/service provider, the deactivated party may still be able to receive voice signals from the originating terminal and other parties. The originating terminal also has the power to terminate other parties from the multipoint call via control signals transmitted to the network server.
With a conference call, the party initiating the call is also considered the originating or controlling terminal. The originating terminal has the power to terminate another party from the conference call. Herein, a conference call is considered a particular type of multipoint call, i.e., a multipoint call in which all parties are always connected to activated lines.
In the multipoint or conference call service, even though at least two call lines are formed and assigned to different call parties individually, calls may be recorded at the originating in a single file regardless of the call parties involved. When the user plays back the recording, in order to access the speech of a particular party, she may need to search the entire file to find it, which can be a time consuming and frustrating process.